Information systems and organisational change
the use of "project engineering" in a hospital emergency service
pp. 208-216
in: Trevor Wood Harper, Nimal Jayaratna, Bob Wood (eds), Methodologies for developing and managing emerging technology based information systems, Berlin, Springer, 1999Abstract
This paper presents important observations and lessons learned from being involved as system analysts in the reorganisation and the development of information systems for an emergency service in a French hospital.The lessons reveal that if the development of information systems is separated from the specific culture of the users and their ways of working, then it will have very little chance of success. This is particularly so in organisations where services performed are "on' people as opposed to "for' people and the service providers are highly knowledgeable and have a strong commitment to their work. Traditional or structured methodologies that seek to treat humans as functional and rational boxes are appropriate for these environments.